Pulitzer Prize Winners

There was no Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2012. Did you know that? I didn’t. There were three finalists, but the word is the eighteen judges couldn’t decide. They have a rule that a two-thirds majority must occur and it didn’t. So the books on the short list stayed there and no one got the award. That’s the first time in thirty-five years no award was given.

A jury of three fiction readers read over three hundred novels and short stories and came up with these finalists:

The Pale King by David Foster Wallace

Train Dreams by Denis Johnson

Swamplandia by Karen Russell

Why couldn’t they decide? Well it’s sort of like the “What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas” rule. The board’s deliberations are sealed, so why they couldn’t agree on a winner, we’ll never know!

What do you think they should have done?

If you want to know more, especially about the process of picking the finalists, check out these articles.

From The Guardian, April 17, 2012: “Pulitzers 2012: prize for fiction withheld for first time in 35 years” by Alison Flood

From The New Yorker, July 8, 2012: “Letter from the Pulitzer Fiction Jury: What Really Happened This Year” by Michael Cunningham

From The New Yorker, July 10, 2012: “Letter from the Pulitzer Fiction Jury, Part II: How To Define Greatness?” by Michael Cunningham

Thanks for visiting – come back soon!

Someday I’d like to say I have read all the Pulitzer Prize winners for fiction. I took a look at the all-time list, and discovered I have a long way to go!

2019: The Overstory by Richard Powers

2018: Less by Andrew Sean Greer (read and reviewed)

2017: The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

2016: The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

2015: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr (read and reviewed)

2014: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

2013: The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson

2012: No award

2011: A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan

2010: Tinkers by Paul Harding

2009: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout (read and reviewed)

2008: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

2007: The Road by Cormac McCarthy (read and reviewed)

2006: March by Geraldine Brooks

2005: Gilead by Marilynne Robinson

2004: The Known World by Edward P. Jones

2003: Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (read but not reviewed)

2002: Empire Falls by Richard Russo (read and reviewed)

2001: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

2000: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

1999: The Hours by Michael Cunningham (read but not reviewed)

1998: American Pastoral by Philip Roth

1997: Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhauser

1996: Independence Day by Richard Ford

1995: The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields

1994: The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx (read but not reviewed)

1993: A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler

1992: A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley

1991: Rabbit At Rest by John Updike

1990: The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos

1989: Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler

1988: Beloved by Toni Morrison (read but not reviewed)

1987: A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor

1986: Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry

1985: Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie

1984: Ironweed by William Kennedy

1983: The Color Purple by Alice Walker (read but not reviewed)

1982: Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike

1981: A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

1980: The Executioner’s Song by Norman Mailer

1979: The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever

1978: Elbow Room by James Alan McPherson

1977: No award

1976: Humboldt’s Gift by Saul Bellow

1975: The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara

1974: No award

1973: The Optimist’s Daughter by Eudora Welty (read but not reviewed)

1972: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner

1971: No award

1970: Collected Stories by Jean Stafford

1969: House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday

1968: The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron

1967: The Fixer by Bernard Malamud

1966: Collected Stories by Katherine Anne Porter

1965: The Keepers Of The House by Shirley Ann Grau

1964: No award

1963: The Reivers by William Faulkner

1962: The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O’Connor

1961: To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee (read and reviewed)

1960: Advise and Consent by Allen Drury

1959: The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters by Robert Lewis Taylor

1958: A Death In The Family by James Agee

1957: No award

1956: Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor

1955: A Fable by William Faulkner

1954: No award

1953: The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway (read and reviewed)

1952: The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk

1951: The Town by Conrad Richter

1950: The Way West by A. B. Guthrie

1949: Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens

1948: Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener

Note – prior to 1948, the awards were split between Novel and Drama. The following winners are from the Novel category

1947: All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren

1946: No award

1945: A Bell for Adano by John Hersey

1944: Journey in the Dark by Martin Flavin

1943: Dragon’s Teeth by Upton Sinclair

1942: In This Our Life by Ellen Glasgow

1941: No award

1940: The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (read and reviewed)

1939: The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings (read but not reviewed)

1938: The Late George Apley by John Phillips Marquand

1937: Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell (read and reviewed)

1936: Honey in the Horn by Harold L. Davis

1935: Now in November by Josephine Winslow Johnson

1934: Lamb in His Bosom by Caroline Miller

1933: The Store by T. S. Stribling

1932: The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck (read but not reviewed)

1931: Years of Grace by Margaret Ayer Barnes

1930: Laughing Boy by Oliver Lafarge

1929: Scarlet Sister Mary by Julia Peterkin

1928: The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder

1927: Early Autumn by Louis Bromfield

1926: Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis

1925: So Big by Edna Ferber

1924: The Able McLaughlins by Margaret Wilson

1923: One of Ours by Willa Cather

1922: Alice Adams by Booth Tarkington

1921: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton (read and reviewed)

1920: No award

1919: The Magnificent Ambersons by Booth Tarkington

1918: His Family by Ernest Poole

To reward you for making it to the bottom of this list, here are a few facts about the Pulitzer Prizes!

The Pulitzer prizes were established in 1917 to recognize outstanding journalism, photography, literature, history, poetry, music and drama.
There are twenty-one award categories. Only United States citizens are eligible to apply for the prize in Letters, Drama and Music, except for the History category of Letters, in which the book must be about the United States, but the author may be of any nationality.
John F. Kennedy has been the only President to receive the Pulitzer Prize. He was awarded the prize in 1957 for his biography, Profiles in Courage.
And for all those self-published and indie authors: Self-published books are eligible for the prize, but they must be available in print!